Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Jane Hirshfield: "The Kingdom"


At times
the heart
stands back
and looks at the body,
looks at the mind,
as a lion
quietly looks
at the not-quite-itself,
not-quite-another,
moving of shadows and grass.

Wary, but with interest,
considers its kingdom.

Then seeing
all that will be,
heart once again enters—
enters hunger, enters sorrow,
enters finally losing it all.
To know, if nothing else,
what it once owned.




"The Kingdom" by Jane Hirshfield. Text as published in The October Palace: Poems (Harper Perennial, 1994).  

Art credit: Untitled photograph by © Scott W. Rouse.

No comments :

Post a Comment

Thank you for participating respectfully in this blog's community of readers.